Fossil files

I’m in the middle of moving offices, with all the packing/unpacking/throwing away it entails. There is a cathartic feel to it.

And, for an information ferret like me, there is enormous temptation to stop and read bits of things I have resolutely refused to throw away. Occasionally, I give in to that temptation. To read. Never to throw away.
This morning I came across an old New Yorker article by Malcolm Gladwell, one that I had filed for a different reason…… to remind me to order a copy of any book that contained the article “The Dark Side of Charisma” by Hogan, Raskin and Fazzini. Which I finally did today, nearly four years later, by ordering Measures of Leadership by Kenneth E. Clark & Miriam B. Clark (Eds.)..

But I couldn’t help re-read the Gladwell article. And just loved the ending. I quote:

They [the consultants] were there looking for people who had the talent to think outside the box. It never occurred to them that, if everyone had to think outside the box, maybe it was the box that needed fixing. Fossilfool time again.

I think the same is true for walled-garden approaches to information and permissioning. In true sixties Suppose-They-Gave-A-War-And-Nobody-Came fashion, what happens if there are DRM/IPR walled gardens everywhere, but all the co-creation is taking place in the open spaces in between? We’re soon going to find out.